


Strictly Business

by midnightsnapdragon



Series: Nostalgia [1]
Category: Lunar Chronicles - Marissa Meyer
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Office AU, The Lunar Chronicles Ship Weeks, tlc ship weeks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-20
Updated: 2016-10-20
Packaged: 2018-08-23 14:51:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8331919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/midnightsnapdragon/pseuds/midnightsnapdragon
Summary: In which Cinder's colleagues fail to restrain their curiosity in the cute new guy she's working with.





	

**i.**

“They say you’re the best architect in Shanghai.”

The young woman didn’t look up from the blueprints she was drawing up. “Who’s ‘they’?”

Kai leaned against the office doorway and hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “Your colleagues.” Who had failed to be subtle as they watched his progress to the architect’s door. “And just about everyone else in Luna Future.”

“Mm.” Pressing her lips together in concentration, she aligned a ruler on the paper and drew a pencil down its length. Her left hand was a complicated-looking prosthetic, plastic knuckles and artificial tendons pulling as she flexed her fingers. 

Kai glanced over his shoulder. Several people who had been eavesdropping turned hastily away, trying to look immersed in their respective jobs. A small blonde woman caught his eye from where she was working at a triple-screen desk and made a shooing motion at him, as if to say, _go on!_

He shifted on his feet. “You called for a mechanical engineer?”

The architect – her office label named her Linh Cinder – finally looked up at him, as if she’d only just noticed his presence, and drew back as if startled. “O-Oh. Hi.” She flourished a hand at the rolling chair on the opposite side of the desk. “Please. I’m just about finished. Madame Nair needs the temple plans before Thursday, and I’d like you to help me check over them.”

Kai shrugged and took a seat. Before the door closed, he thought he heard someone whisper, “Ten dollars says he’ll ask her out.”

**ii.**

In the time it took them to go over the plans for the temple’s architecture and general structure, checking and rechecking the measurements, a lot of people seemed to take interest in their project. From what he could see of Cinder and her colleagues, Kai could guess that while she didn’t like her work being interrupted, it usually happened multiple times a day.

But frankly, it was getting suspicious.

Thorne, coming in with “a new set of measurements,” who gave Kai a good once-over.

“You sent those to me yesterday,” Cinder grumped, waving him off.

Cress, the shy tech specialist, lingering by the door long after Cinder answered her question about the printer that had supposedly been acting up.

A man with a name tag calling him JACIN CLAY, who swept in like he owned the place to demand (on Madame Nair’s behalf, of course) if the blueprints were done yet, acting surprised when he saw Kai there. “I didn’t realize you had company over,” he drawled. “Maybe you’d like to bring your new friend to lunch with the rest of us.”

“We’re not done yet,” Cinder snapped, looking annoyed, just as Kai corrected, “I’m here strictly on business.”

Five minutes later, a beautiful woman with warm brown skin bounced through the door, skipping past the desk at such speed that the papers scattered. Kai watched, looking amused, as Cinder scolded her friend and shooed her out the door, but not before the woman stage-whispered, “He’s handsome!”

Kai pretended not to hear. He could see Cinder’s temper rising and had no desire to incur her probably considerable capacity for angry speeches.

They had just begun to work again when the office door opened a fifth time, Thorne strolling in. “Hey, Cinder, how’s it –“

Growling, Cinder slammed her binder shut and stood from the table. _“Thorne – !“_

The look on her face must have been terrifying, because Thorne threw up his hands in self-defence and backed out of the room immediately.

Kai watched with raised eyebrows as Cinder slowly sat back down, her lips pressed into a tight line.

He cleared his throat. “Are you sure you’re Linh Cinder? Luna Future's leading architect?”

“Yes,” she sighed, not seeming to care that he was teasing. “Why?”

“I don’t know,” Kai said innocently, shuffling his papers. “You seem more like the 'public relations' type.”

Cinder gave him a look that could have curdled milk.

“What? Surely they just wanted advice, or – or help?”

“Trust me,” she muttered, picking up her pencil again, “you don’t know my friends.”

*-*

_Please review._


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